A Guide
by It'sTimeToDance
Summary: Darry's the one who has to teach the lessons in this family. Not quite drabble.


--let him--

_they'll kick you and they'll beat you and they'll tell you it's fair so beat it, just beat it_

-Michael Jackson

Ponyboy looked like a kicked puppy.

Not all the time. Not even most of the time. In fact, he mostly looked like a regular puppy, with nothing special about it except a whimsical glint in his big grey eyes. But right now, right this minute, he kinda looked like a kick puppy.

Kinda.

He came into the front door with a scratch on his forehead and dry blood around his nostrils, like he hurriedly tried to wipe away evidence of it as he walked down the street. His brother Sodapop was drinking sodapop and when Pony came in he dropped the sodapop.

"Darry!" he called, just because he was twelve and he never knew what to do about anything, but Darry did. Ponyboy was nine, and Darry was fifteen. "Darry, Dad!"

Soda came up to Pony and held his face in his hand, like he'd seen his mom do that one time he fell from a tree and a tooth fell out. "Crap, your _bleeding!"_

"Soda," Pony huffed, nudging off his brothers hand as a heat rose to his cheeks. "Get _off."_

"What's going on in here--"

Their mother stopped in her tracks, a dishrag in one hand and a cracked cup in the other. Her mouth made an _O _and Ponyboy would have found it funny if--

_"What happened?" _She dropped the plate on the table beside the sofa and ran up to her youngest, dropping to her knees and furiously dabbing at his forehead with the dishrag. She looked sharply at Soda. "Did he fall? Did he get into--did _you _get into a fight?" She directed her gaze at Pony.

"What's all the screaming about?" Darrel Curtis Sr. came in, now, his sharp chin jutting over the edge of the doorway and glancing at the room. "What--?"

"Ponyboy got into a fight at school," his wife interrupted, holding on to her son's wrist as though to keep him from running.

Ponyboy shook her off, looking indignant. "I did _not--"_

Darry was the last to enter, coming from outside with dirt stains on his jeans and a football in his hands. The ghost of laughter was still definite on his face.

He took one look at Pony and groaned a momentous groan. "God, Pony."

Pony looked down at his shoes. "I tried to fight back," he said quietly. "It wasn't fair. They're were four of 'em. I tried, really..."

_"What? _Four of _who? _Darrel, do you know anything about this?"

Darry and Soda exchanged a glance, and this is what Ponyboy was thinking:

_Looking at each other, like, oh yeah, of course. Bound to happen sometime. Poor baby._

And so on.

"Mom," Darry said, quietly. "We'll talk to him."

After some coaxing _(much coaxing) _and questioning, Darrel finally dragged Mrs. Curtis from the room and into the kitchen. ("Let the boys talk to him. They know more about it then we do.")

Darry remembered the first time he'd been jumped. Well, not _jumped, _exactly. He was sitting at recess, poking at a football and waiting for his friend Mike to get back from the nurse's office (got himself chucked off the swing set, the bastard) when some kids in nice shirts and clean pants started poking at him. Nothing bad, nothing like getting the crap beaten outta you. Just poking, with sticks and all all that. But Darry was a hot head, back in first grade. He wouldn't take none of that.

So, he came home with a black eye.

That, for various reasons, seemed like a jumping.

This, for obvious reasons, was a jumping.

"I was just walking," Pony said, his voice thick like he was forcing the words out. "Outta the school, you know, by the big sign and stuff. They just came outta no where, started pounding on me. I tried to fight them off, Darry...I wasn't fair..." His voice was quivering, now. Shaking and quivering and tears running down his face like water bursting from a dam. Darry kneeled down in front of him, and Soda hovered close by.

"Hey," Darry said, quietly, his voice steadily rising as his little brother crept towards hysterics. "_Hey, _shut up, will ya? Come on." He ran a hand over Pony's skinny shoulder, waiting for the furious sniffles to run their course. "Come on," he said again.

Pony finally looked up at him, with bruised eyes and flushed cheeks, and he still looked younger then nine. Not much, not like three or something. Not nine, though.

Ever since he was little, he seemed smaller then he should be. Soda always joked he was shrinking.

"It's not fair," he said again, his voice even and steady but still quivering, just a bit.

Darry couldn't help it. "Life ain't fair, little buddy."

Pony did not seem surprised by this, or even remotely stricken. Just angry. Just sad.

Just.

"See," Soda said, "it ain't cause of you, or nothing. It's just cause you ain't got the nice clothes they do. It ain't yer fault're nothing. They're just jerks is all."

"I didn't do nothing," Pony whispered, his brow furrowed and the dry blood on his face making him look almost demonic. "I was just walking. I didn't _do _anything."

"You don't have to," Darry said, his voice just as quiet as before. "You just gotta learn to fight back."

He hated this.

Darry _really _hated this.

He didn't want to turn his brother into this. Didn't want to see him become another greaser kid, another hood with a switchblade and a scowl. He didn't want another Dallas Winston hanging around.

But, damnit, what else could he do?

Let him walk around the streets getting beat on?

Let him learn it himself?

Let him come home like _this _everyday?

Let him get himself killed?

Let him?

Pony searched his face like he didn't know what he was looking at.

Angry, confused eyes turned to sad ones. Sad, sad eyes.

"I don't want to fight," said Pony.

Soda muttered to himself, "_Sonofabitch_."

He realized Pony was crying again, crying softly and under his breath like a gasp. He said, over and over. "I don't _wanna _fight, Darry. I _don't."_

Neither do I, Darry wanted to scream at him, shake him and make him stop his mindful, stupid, terrible crying. You think I wanna fight all the time? You think I _like _this? You think it's any easier for _me?_

He didn't scream, though, and he didn't shake him.

At fifteen years old, Darrel Curtis jsut pulled his little brother to him for lack of anything else to do, rubbing his hand up and down his back and waiting for the tears to stop. "None of us do," he said, feeling Soda put a hand on Pony's shoulder. "Damnit, _none _of us do."

Life just sucks that way.

**A/N Eh, feeling a bit 'life sucks'-ish today. I actually feel pretty good about this one, for once, but then again, everyone always tells me the ones I think suck are ZOMGTHEBEST so maybe this one really is terrible. Let me know, kind readers. **


End file.
